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Definition of litmus test in English:

litmus test

noun

‘He defined the modern idea of an ‘element’, as well as introducing the litmus test to tell acids from bases, and introduced many other standard chemical tests.’

1.1A decisively indicative test.

‘opposition to the nomination became a litmus test for political support of candidates’

‘‘It's a litmus test of the health of the high-yield market,’ says one private equity investor.’

‘The self-proclaimed American Bard, Whitman has also come to be seen as the litmus test for the literature of American democracy.’

‘Her input, however, didn't seem to pass the litmus test.’

‘Under the Federal Guidelines of 1971, statistical representation became the litmus test of discrimination.’

‘The first is that, once again, we have legislation that is a litmus test in terms of the difference between this Government and the Opposition.’

‘Interest group activity may provide a litmus test for the degree to which the supranational institutions of the EU exercise independent influence over the policy process.’

‘Well, the main litmus test, and it's written into the law, is that the U.S. parent company cannot directly manage or directly own the subsidiary.’

‘We do not suggest that these considerations are exhaustive but plainly there seems to be a need to identify marks that a trial judge can effectively look at in applying a litmus test to the situation.’

‘This closing example was really the litmus test for me.’

‘According to some who have worked there, the White House counsel's office doesn't run candidates through an ideological litmus test.’

‘By the 1900s, it had become the litmus test of public health among the medical profession and the urban middle class.’

‘If the litmus test for aerospace integration is completely interchangeable air and space communities, such a goal is probably unrealistic.’

‘When sex becomes the litmus test of morality, when we focus disproportionate attention on sexual sin, we do harm by omission.’

‘‘The litmus test for privatisation is whether it increases competition in the sector,’ she said.’